The Other Universe
by the stargate time traveller
Summary: Set in my AU of Stargate - and the AARU Doctor Who universe with Peter Cushing. Set in Season 7 of Voyager. Endgame hasn't happened. A few years before my fic Deception, Susan Who travelled into another reality, where she encounters the starship Voyager. Before she can help them, an old enemy appears...
1. Chapter 1

Authors Note. To the readers of Deception my Stargate - Doctor Who crossover, this story is an introduction of sorts.

**The Other Universe.**

**Crossover.**

Normally Susan was soothed by the sounds of TARDIS, allowing the time and space machine's hum to remind her of the times she'd spent working in the labs, watching holographic simulations of temporal evolution on a planet, or even spending time with her grandfather, but not at the moment. The time machine had too many ghosts, too many memories outside the technological marvels it contained. It had been a long time since she'd travelled in the time and space machine she and her grandfather had constructed, her grandfather could do many things when he put his mind to it, but even he had no power over life. Susan had been going to school, spending her holidays travelling with her grandfather, if and when he remembered to return of course. Granted Susan, and in many cases Barbara and Louise, when the latter hadn't been travelling with her uncle and wasn't pursuing her own education, could easily take care of herself. Her grandfather had travelled on his own for a long time, and Susan had often worried about him. His health had been on the decline, she remembered vividly how, when they'd been on Skaro, and exploring the Dalek City, he'd been breathless on several occasions, and unlike Ian, Barbara, and herself, he'd taken the full brunt of the radiation sickness, and he'd had trouble keeping up with the Thals.

There had been many nights, and days spent in school when she should have been listening to her teachers that Susan had worried herself sick, and made her wish she and her grandfather had some form of communications that worked over time and space distances. It hadn't been until Susan and her grandfather had travelled to the 21st century at a time before Anubis' attack, they'd solved the problem. They'd bought a few mobile phones, and with some work they'd figured out how to create a decent communications link, though even when Susan had been studying she could hear over the communications link how her grandfather was losing his strength. On days, and indeed nights, Susan, Barbara and Louise had to bear listening to their grandfather, and uncle, failing. The constant travelling was taking its toll on Dr. Julian Who.

When he'd returned to them at last, the three girls could see where he'd been last had been the last place he would ever travel too. He'd died of natural causes, and had been buried in a normal graveyard. Susan had since then resisted the urge to travel in time again, until now.

Susan Who had been a preteen when Barbara's boyfriend Ian had stumbled into the dematerialisation lever, sending them to Skaro, and in the time between that first mess with the Daleks, to Barbara leaving, to Louise and Tom, and the Dalek invasion of the Earth, only two years had passed. Her grandfather, Dr. Julian Who had been in his 60s during that time, and at that age both he and Susan had needed to take care of each other.

* * *

TARDIS was a dimensionally transcendental world. Generated by a series of dark matter-gravity warp generators, the interior dimension had been achieved by warping subspace in a way similar to blowing a bubble, or filling a balloon with water. Originally TARDIS had merely been one single room, the control room. Dr. Who had enlarged the design, manipulating the subspace bubble to make the interior much larger.

As Susan left the lounge, she couldn't help remembering how when she and her grandfather were building the control room, despite being such a brilliant and able scientist, he completely was unable to grasp how to properly build a time machine as complex as TARDIS.

Susan remembered how long it had taken TARDIS to be made, even before her contributions to the project which allowed the pocket dimension to become possible with her mathematical skills and Dr. Who's scientific ability, and all the results they had were inside that single control room at first. Unlike the present control room, the original had resembled something from a scrapyard; the components were on the walls, unprotected in case of a disaster, wires trailing everywhere.

Then again it had been part of the plan. Susan, Barbara and their grandfather had spent many nights discussing and debating the topic of TARDIS, going over the myriad of ideas. The trio of time machine builders had gone over numerous science fiction books, obviously time travel. Of course now Susan had seen most of it during her travels; nanotechnology, biotechnology, energy sources that drained energy from the universe itself, and sights beyond any of their comprehension, and despite the hell they'd gone through after, Susan still remembered how she'd felt when she'd first stepped foot on the planet Skaro. Elation, excitement, and the possibility of adventure. Granted, fighting the Daleks hadn't been what she'd had in mind, but the petrified forest outside the city had fascinated her and her grandfather, at least until they found out how it had happened.

Building TARDIS wasn't as simple as some might think, it had been grandfathers plan to travel through the universe, learn about various sciences and technologies in their infancy, or not even dreamt of by anyone in the time they'd first built the time ship. The plan had been to integrate those same technologies into the time machine, make it more advanced, and modifying the ship to accomodate new means to study the universe.

Susan walked into the control room, taking in the consoles that controlled the time machine, though when her eyes took in the bronze device, so incongruous in this setting of black coloured walls, silver coloured consoles, anyone would realise the device wasn't part of the usual TARDIS technology. The device was the shape of small pyramid, there was a ruby coloured gem in a gold lined seal.

To those who didn't understand Ancient technology, the device was meaningless.

But Susan knew what it was, she possessed a gene along with many in her family, and she understood the physics this device would use. It was a reality drive, a device similar but more sophisticated than the quantum mirrors the Ancients had left scattered around the galaxy. Susan shuddered as she recalled the time her grandfather and Barbara had gone through one leaving her behind with Ian, only to return terrified after spending hours in the prime reality

They'd seen a Dalek invasion of the Milky Way, sweeping through the galaxy, attacking world after world. Even the Goa'uld's arrogance had been unable to fight back against the scourge of the Dalek onslaught. No race had been safe, and the worst of it was disclosure. In order to help, her grandfather's deceased counterpart had revealed the truth of TARDIS, and the Dalek weaknesses.

For a time the help had been enough, but then it went wrong. Susan didn't know the details, all she did know was by the time her grandfather and sister had returned home after Susan had worked out how to use the quantum mirror properly, they were shaken and terrfied.

Susan snapped out of the memories she had, races like the Goa'uld, the Wraith, the Cybermen and the Daleks were going to stop her from travelling to different realities.

This was just going to be a small trip, nothing major, but it might lead to other things, though the memory of the time Susan spent waiting near the quantum mirror would be with her, always.

She didn't want a repeat.

Moving quickly before she could change her mind, Susan walked to the door controls and electromagnetically locked them. She powered up the time and space destination consoles, and the dematerialisation circuits before heading for the reality drive. She simply turned it on, but didn't activate it.

Susan went to the space destination console, and considered. Where to make the test? It was best if it was out of the way, somewhere remote and far from any hostile power such as the Goa'uld.

It was a bad idea to travel outside the galaxy, she thought, then again it was just as bad to travel around this one. Susan frowned, and a number popped into her mind. One of the arms, definitely, and a good 75,000 light years from Earth.

Decision made Susan started setting the controls before engaging the drive units. There was a shift in the internal gravity as TARDIS reached its destination, in the vacuum of space, then again the gravity net always shifted to show the travellers the time machine was travelling. The gravity net in the floor panneling adapted to the shift from planetary gravity to just empty space.

Travel was instantaneous.

After checking on the co-ordinates, and the astro sextant, Susan began setting the controls on the drive, delicately making adjustments to the gem before she pushed it...

* * *

" Captain," Ensign Harry Kim reported from his console. " I'm detecting a distortion ahead. Its a rip in the space/time continuum." Captain Kathryn Janeway glanced at her first officer. Chakotay's frown spoke volumes, this was bad. " Mr Paris, drop us out of warp."

" Captain," Tuvok reported. Janeway felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up when she heard the tone of that voice. Tuvok's tone indicated something worrying was about to happen. When she turned around, she saw the Vulcan security officer look grim. " Something seems to be coming through."

" Whatever it is," Kim agreed, " it's small."

" Onscreen." Chakotay ordered.

Janeway had seen many temporal rifts before, but this one was different. " Analysis of the rift, Mr Kim."

Kim checked his readings. " It's hard to be certain, the object coming through is obscuring our readings of the rift. It began as a temporal rift, but its now reading like an interdimensional rift."

" This is getting better by the minute," Chakotay murmured, though only Janeway heard him.

The comm. chirped. " Astrometrics to bridge, the rift is causing ripples in subspace. It is drawing us nearer."

Seven's report made Tom Paris check his readings. He turned grimly. " Confirmed, we're being pulled closer, its like an ebbing tide, drawing us into the sea."

Seven's droll voice replied, reminding the conn officer she was still online, " The oceanic simile is appropriate and close, Lieutenant, but it is far from the truth."

Chakotay had to hide his smirk. Love her or hate her, Seven would always tell you the truth.

Kim looked up. " It's here."

On the screen, the bridge crew had a good view of the object appearing. Harry was right about it being small, it wasn't any larger than an upright probe, or a wardrobe.

As soon as the object was through, the rift snapped shut. Janeway hoped whoever, or whatever this thing was, as it was way too small to be a viable spacecraft, it had a way home.

" Can we get a closer look, Harry?" She asked Kim.

Harry obliged.

" Its a blue box." Chakotay said, unable to believe it.

Tom was looking the box intently, then his eyes widened, and then they narrowed in disbelief. " A phone box?" He said, his voice almost hysterical in surprise.

Janeway had started at Tom's voice. " A what, Tom?"

" They were placed on street corners, giving people communications the same way our combadges do," Tom replied, gazing almost wonderingly at the object in front of him, but still unable to believe it. " Over time and mobile communications took over with the internet, telephone boxes just vanished as they lost use."

" What's this one doing here then?" Kim asked.

Tom snorted. " Why are you asking me, Harry? You expect me to have all the answers about the 20th century, how about you take a guess. I have no idea why a police call box is here, now in front of us, 75,000 light years from Earth, four hundred years since the day they were withdrawn."

" Alright," Chakotay interrupted, trying to stop a possible fight though he had to agree from Tom's perspective that Harry expecting the pilot to have answers for everything was just pushing it. " Let's concentrate on what's important."

Janeway nodded in agreement, her eyes fixed on the box." Agreed. Mr Kim, get a lock on that box. Beam it onboard."

" Aye Captain," Harry replied, but before he could program the computer to activate the transporters, his console beeped. He didn't need to report why. Janeway blinked. Where the screen had shown a blue box that just came out of a rift, it now showed the rift. The box had vanished.

" Where is it?" Janeway hissed, her hands on the rail.

" It's just...vanished, Captain." Harry reported.

Janeway was fond of Harry Kim, she couldn't help but sometimes want to pat him on the head, but there were times when he had the unfortunate habit of stating the obvious.

" I can see that, I want to know why." Janeway replied, twisting on the spot to show the hapless ensign how close she was to losing her patience. Luckily he read the danger signs.

Fortunately for Harry, Tuvok had news. " Captain. I have reason to believe, as Mr. Kim was just locking the transporter on the object, the device had a transporter of its own. I have just detected a subspace-temporal distortion in cargo bay 2."

Janeway fixed a look at her security officer. " Get security down there. Now!"

* * *

Susan wasn't even aware there was a ship nearby at first when TARDIS emerged into the new universe, because she'd been checking on the astrometric readings. If there was one thing she enjoyed about time travelling, even in one space, there was always a surprise. In her home reality, several stars weren't in their current positions. TARDIS's sensors had already detected seven solar systems, a pulsar cluster over half a thousand light years away, and a neutron star along with a red giant.

After logging them into the databank to schedule time to investigate them, Susan was about to change the co-ordinate control, and travel to Earth. That was when she found her entrance had been discovered. The image of the starship...Susan had seen many spacecraft in her time, from Cyber ships, Dalek battlecruisers, Goa'uld motherships, Ori vessels, the legendary Asgard ships of great power, to the city ships of the Ancients themselves.

TARDIS was able to scan the ship far rapidly than the ship had done for TARDIS, and without being detected. Susan studied the design. It was advanced, and judging from the readings she was receiving it had. It had two winglike projections, and from what Susan could tell it was part of a spatial warp mechanism. Susan frowned. She'd encountered warp technology before; the Asgard had used space warping technology before they'd met the Ancients, albeit more advanced than the kind she was seeing now, who'd shown them kindly how to access hyperspace. TARDIS had taken her and her grandfather to Othala, the Asgard's homeworld, on one of their almost annual visits. Grandfather had been as fascinated about the Asgard as they had about them. The Asgard were always fascinated by the humans with the Ancient gene.

The Asgard were far from the only race to have warp tech; even the Ancients had used a variety of the technology, albeit more advanced than that of the Asgard. Susan remembered seeing those seeding ships that the Ancients had constructed to seed outer galaxies with Stargates and DHD's, and they'd possessed powerful warp engines.

Susan's experience with warp technology also made her think of the Daleks. They'd discovered the basics of space flight, just after they'd learnt after the visit to Skaro there was life on other worlds, and they'd developed warp technology to build an empire across their home galaxy. Those early designs had used space surfing rather than space folding, but the Daleks changed that. The Dalek flying saucer that she'd seen during the trip to 2150 AD Earth had been powered by such a warp propulsion engine design. Just by looking at this ship, however, Susan could tell this particular warp propulsion technology was primitive compared to what she knew about the Dalek design, but then again most warp propulsion engines from her reality tended to use the principle used by the Daleks even though they hadn't invented the first warp design.

Dalek warp fields took many layers of subspace, and folded it over to travel great distances. Dalek ships could travel distances of seven thousand light years in just one jump, but this one...It would take months, maybe even a year or two, to reach that distance. Susan ran another scan over the ship, and found the navigational deflector. For a moment she wondered what it was, then she detected how the energy fields produced by the dish repelled any dust. Fascinating.

Scanning the ship, Susan discovered it was inhabited by humans and the ship. She frowned. The vessel wasn't made from the usual metals, though the scans indicated the ship's alloys were stronger in some ways to many of the alloys she knew were used by various races, though there was no trace of Naquadah, trinium, or other materials. What? Its power source was also off. Antimatter. Susan frowned harder, her curiosity making her take note as TARDIS noted the readings down; she knew the Ancients had experimented with antimatter, even using it from time to time, but they'd never been dependent on it. But this ship had a central matter / antimatter reactor, and it was linked to the warp engines. There was no trace of any more advanced power sources, no neutrino ion generators. No ZPMs.

The inhabitants of the ship were also a surprise, because aside from humans there was no race on the ship that matched anything in the databases - Asgard, Goa'uld, Ori, Ancient, and even the humans were different. There was no sign of Ancient physiology, no sign of the ancient gene in the bodies even though such a thing was a possibility of a million to one, and that surprised her. All humans in her reality had, in some fashion, influence of the Ancients even if they hadn't possessed the gene, but these ones didn't.

Susan was about to run more scans when she saw a light on the controls. It took her a second to remember what it was, a transporter lock. They were going to beam her and TARDIS onboard, but Susan panicked.

The last time someone had transported TARDIS, it had been the Daleks. Susan remembered the painful torture she'd endured for a few months before her grandfather had been able to find her, with the help of the Asgard, and they'd destroyed the Dalek ship between them, but the memory was still there.

Susan quickly set the controls to transport TARDIS to the ship, setting the controls to a random place onboard before they got a proper lock, and engaged the materialisation lever. It took a second, and the gravity compensators in the grav net kicked in to stabilise in the artificial gravity environment outside. Susan walked over to the scanner and turned it on so she could see with her own eyes what was going on; she had every belief the people who crewed this vessel had advanced sensors enough to detect a matter transmission if they possessed technology like the Asgard transporters, and picking up TARDIS's materialisation should be childs play.

The image on the screen confused her, as the lighting was fairly bright. The number of containers was proof enough of where TARDIS had landed on the ship inside a cargo hold, but there were a number of strange alcoves lining the walls. Susan wrinkled her nose as she looked at them. Of all the things to have in a cargo hold... Susan activated a scan on the alcoves. They seemed to be power taps of some kind, and yet they were large enough for a person to stand in, they reminded Susan of the power clip alcoves used by early models of the Cybermen before they changed to naquadah powered generators in their chest plates.

Susan's mind raced as she considered her options, those options dwindled when the door opened and a number of people wearing military style uniforms with gold/yellow bands around the shoulder where the rest of the body was black. The uniforms meant nothing to Susan, it was the silver objects they had in their hands that worried her. The way they held them told her what they were, weapons of somekind.

Susan considered. TARDIS possessed a forcefield that could protect her, she could stay inside for a long time, but the engine's power was drained by the amount of power needed to travel to this reality. The power had been drained even more by transfering to this ship, and that meant the field was down. Besides the door mechanism didn't have a lock, a security matter neither she nor her grandfather had managed to crack despite many opportunities, but because of matters beyond their control they hadn't bothered to work on the lock.

Susan sagged. She knew she couldn't win, TARDIS was still regenerating from the transit to this ship, and to this reality, and the forcefield wouldn't stop any of the people outside from getting in.

There was no choice.

Switching off the scanner, Susan walked to the hatstand but not before she'd flicked on the safety selector switch, and took down her jacket and put it on her. Setting the collar, Susan reached over with a free hand, and released the doors.

Taking a deep breath, she carefully opened the double doors of the outer police box shell. She opened them a crack, so then they could see her, and very slowly opened the door the rest of the way. Susan stepped out over the threshold, lightly bouncing on her feet to get a feel of the gravity, closing the doors slowly so they clicked quietly.

Very calmly, very slowly, Susan raised her hands to show she was no threat.

Stepping away from TARDIS, partially to keep the time machine protected, and to take away all attention so then this crew would be interested primarily on her for the time being, though she knew it would not last.

" Hello," she said slowly, hoping one of them wouldn't shoot her; though none of them looked trigger happy, one false move could see her dead or stunned. " My name is Susan Who. I mean you no harm."

**Author's note. I decided to write this particular story before my next Stargate one, mostly to show the setting off the story. Please tell me what you think.**


	2. Chapter 2 A Prisoner, again

Disclaimer - I neither own Star Trek Voyager, the bits of Stargate in this story, or indeed the AARU Doctor Who movies. I do own this idea, though.

**The Other Universe.**

**A Prisoner, again.**

Captain Janeway was watching the monitor in the observation lounge with her senior officers, looking at their new visitor. Though conventional visitors very rarely appeared in a telephone booth without warning. The girl was in her late 20s or even in her early 20s, somewhere along those lines. Janeway wasn't entirely sure; those closeups of the girl's face she'd seen had shown an almost ageless quality to her. She considered what had happened after this Susan, as she called herself, introduced herself to the security team.

The young woman had easily submitted to a medical examination with little resistence, which was a switch. After that she'd been moved to the brig for close observation.

Harry's voice broke through her thoughts. " I don't get it," he said, " she obviously had the means to escape us easily. Why didn't she take it? Why is she co-operating?"

Seven quirked a brow. " Not everyone has the intention of escaping, Ensign. Logically, you are correct. This Susan could have escaped easily from our custody. The fact she has not escaped could mean either her...object is unable to travel anymore, which could mean its a form of escape pod. If it is not, then the same fact could apply. Voyager has been drained of power, and fuel on several occasions, has it not?"

No one spoke, they were too busy absorbing Seven's point. They had to admit she was right.

" A ship?" Tom's voice belied his puzzlement. " How can a box in the shape of 1960s police telephone booth be a ship?"

Janeway had no intention of having a debate, not when she wanted positive answers. " We can answer that later," she said grimly. " I want answers, and facts to back them up. Seven, Chakotay, I want you to question our guest. Harry, B'elanna, I want you to study this box in our cargo bay. Take a small engineering team."

" Aye Captain." They said when they received their orders. They moved to leave, but Janeway wasn't finished.

" In the meantime," she added, getting their attention to show they hadn't been dismissed yet. " I'm going to go to Sickbay, and find out what the Doctor found out."

She smiled. " Dismissed."

* * *

Harry Kim, like many of his generation, had been brought up in an age where communications worldwide, or indeed around the Federation, was simple and uncomplicated, but as was true, they never actually bothered much with the evolution of such advancements. Like many though, his education had been broad enough to go into the basics, and just the basics because they hadn't been concerned with how older generations had managed, of early communications systems, the old internet part of it - computers linked together, allowing information to be passed around the world faster than those letter things on paper. How that worked, he didn't know, but he was willing to bet Tom didn't either.

With the discovery of subspace and faster than light communications, sending a message was quick, easy, simple, and could use visual or audio in either choice.

Seeing this object made Harry wonder how the people of the 20th century couldn't work without advanced technology, but that was another time and meant nothing to Harry.

He took out his tricorder, flipped it open and started work by scanning the object. " I don't know if Seven's theory is right or not, but there's enough power coming from that box to power Voyager, and our shuttle complement for months." He smiled at B'elanna. " Maybe we should ask the owner."

B'elanna ignored him. She was concentrating on her readings. " Look at the energy profile. There are dark matter particles, chronitons, gravitons...all kinds of exotic energy, and there's even subspace energy laced in." She looked up, her mouth open. " How can so much power fit inside a small wooden box?"

Harry shrugged. " Hey, don't look at me. I dunno."

Torres glared at him, before turning to her crew. They'd been waiting patiently for the senior officers to hurry up. " I want a complete check outside, gather as much data as possible."

The crew walked closer to the box.

* * *

" I've made a complete check of her DNA, Captain," the Doctor was saying. " She's human, definitely, though there have been a number of changes to her brain chemistry."

" What changes?" Janeway asked, her voice, face and body language demanding answers.

" I haven't completed my analysis yet," the hologram answered apologetically. " But it appears her brain has been exposed to highly advanced technology. It is almost as though her brain has been fed tremendous amounts of information. Though I am only theorising." The Doctor added.

For Janeway, this whole thing was becoming even more curious. " Alright, Doctor, keep me posted. I only hope Seven and Chakotay find out more from her by speaking."

Walking briskly out of sickbay, the Doctor sighed as he got on with his tests.

* * *

Before Seven and Chakotay had come down, Susan had been on the point of sleeping.

There was very little else to do, and she couldn't help herself despite her trying to fight against the pull of sleep. The cell she'd been brought to was a lot more open than other cells she'd been in before, with the forcefield allowing her a limited view of the metal walled bulkheads surrounding her cell. The brig was simple, sparsely decorated. There was just a bunk on the wall, looking outwards of the cell, but there was a small basin for washing, and a small bucket to use as a toilet. Susan was also dismayed by the lack of stimuli around her. Unless she made her own, then her brain would rot. That was the point. But there was nothing for Susan to do, and she was beginning to wish she'd brought a pack of cards, or a mini chessboard, or even a book.

That was the problem with time and space travel, you never knew if you were going to end up in a cell. Susan grimaced, the memories of dozens of instances where she or her grandfather were in prison coming to the surface, just like the time she'd spent in Dalek custody. Until that point she'd thought the Daleks were not interested in torturing people.

She'd been searched, as was typical, and aside from her hairpins and her clothes, Susan had been left alone. No one had spoken to her, and the guard had clearly been told not to speak to her. As she sat down for the first few hours, she'd let her mind wander. Susan wasn't concerned much about TARDIS. The safety selector meant no one could operate the machine without the Ancient gene, more precisely, hers. And they wouldn't be able to leave the control room, or open the panels of the consoles. Susan had designed the feature herself after discovering the presence of the gene. The memories of how easily Ian had panicked, and set TARDIS on a wild ride as the time and space machine had been recalibrating from the unprogrammed journey to Skaro, landing in seven different places before the ship had managed to work it all out by a shut down and reactivation still remained to this day one of Susan's most undesired memories.

Encountering the Ancients had led to the discovery of the gene, so it had been easy to ask them to improve the security of TARDIS, once they'd gotten over being impressed with the design. Then again, even the Asgard had been fascinated.

It irritated her no end, she thought, returning to the present as she contemplated being locked up again. She'd been locked in the cell for at least 4 hours and 40 minutes now, and she was growing bored, hence the reason she was about to fall asleep. The doors opening, and a whispered conversation between a man, a woman and the guard could be heard. Susan sat up straight, her fatigue and lethargy leaving her.

Two people approached.

One was a man wearing one of the uniforms, red this time. There seemed to be three primary colours on this ship, and this man must be someone in authority. Susan studied him. He was a big man, with a soft but strong and kindly face. He had a tatoo over his right eye, and his hair was black.

The woman herself was fascinating. She wore what Susan would call a unitard, but it didn't look like it. It seemed to have a purpose other than exercise. She was tall, and her hair was a shade of blond that gleamed in the light. Susan was fascinated by her because the woman had something like a metal eyebrow on the right, her left, side of her face, and she had a metal laced hand, like some sort of glove.

Susan stood up slowly.

The man introduced himself, " I am Commander Chakotay, and this is Seven."

Susan nodded. " Susan Who."

" Who?" The woman, Seven, asked puzzled, her head cocked.

Susan grinned; how many times had people been confused by her surname? " It's my surname." She explained.

" Ah." Seven replied.

Chakotay smiled. " Where are you from?"

Susan had been expecting to be interrogated at some point, so she'd been preparing. She sat back down. " I'm from another universe. I come from what you would call the closing part of the 20th century, and the early 21st century."

" You're a time traveller."

" A time and space traveller, now reality traveller," Susan corrected. " There is a difference. Time and space travellers can travel anywhere, and anywhen. Time travellers can only travel in time."

But Chakotay had heard only one part of the explanation, and he fixed on it. " You can travel anywhere in space/time?" He asked.

Susan shrugged like it wasn't that big a deal to her. " Yes." As she said that word, she couldn't help but wonder why the commander's question had been so determined, desperate. Then she remembered the readings TARDIS had taken of the ship from space. Warp engines, and using a rather primitive version of it.

" How long have you been out here?" Susan asked curiously as a thought came to mind.

Chakotay and Seven exchanged a glance. " Seven years."

" And you're trying to get home." Susan surmised. " I see."

" I don't," Chakotay interrupted, surprised as Seven was by how the conversation had shifted. Now this woman was asking them questions, and they were supposed to ask them, she was supposed to listen and reply.

" Your warp engines are basic," Susan replied, leaning back against the wall with her arms folded, her tone so serious neither Voyager crewmember even thought of contradicting her. " Your generate a field that enables you to surf on space, allowing you to reach faster than light speeds, but there's still a travel time. Most of the warp propulsion methods I've seen were similar to yours to begin with, but the designers realised quickly it's not a practical space travel system."

Chakotay shook his head, wondering how this woman, even if she was a time traveller and had seen technologies like that, would even think they had the means to change.

" Warp technology has allowed us to reach the stars. We depend on warp drive, and we're not alone." He argued.

Susan sighed. " Okay, but how many advances have allowed you to go faster? Your warp field requires a balance of fuel and energy ratio, but what if you didn't need any of that for so many warp fields?"

Chakotay stepped forwards, his eyes and face wide in shock as he contemplated what this stranger was saying. " Are you saying our propulsion is wrong?"

" I didn't say that. All I'm saying is your system was okay as a starting point, but maybe it's time to change." Susan looked around the cell she was in, and gazed imploringly at the two of them, then what she was about to say was forgotten as she focused on Seven. Again, curiosity about this woman was made clear to both Chakotay and the former Borg drone.

" What happened to you?" Susan asked Seven.

Seven cocked her head, then she understood the question. Afterall she'd experienced it many times since joining the Voyager crew, her Borg heritage sparking anger and hatred for the collective, but this woman seemed genuinely perplexed.

" I am a former member of the Borg collective." Seven replied, fully expecting this Susan to understand what she meant. When she realised Susan still didn't understand, she realised that either Susan had never encountered the Borg in her reality, in which case it was only a matter of time, or the collective simply didn't exist.

" The Borg collective is made up of races who are cybernetically augmented, with implants like the ones on my hand and face, their minds linked to a hive connection. With thousands of races linked, their collective knowledge is merged together-"

" Sounds like the Cybermen," Susan interrupted, looking grim. She shot a look at Seven, a combination of stare and glare, and asked her pointedly.

" Tell me," she asked darkly, " does this collective ask races to join it, or do they force them to?"

Seven looked down uncomfortably, but the look was enough for Susan to pass judgement. " Definitely like the Cybermen, then." She mused. In every reality it seemed, there was a mirror opposite.

" Who are these Cybermen?" Chakotay asked, trying to regain some measure of control over this whole thing. This interrogation was becoming less like one, and more of a chat. The commander loathed interrogations, they were more often or not trials where the facts could be misinterpreted unfairly, but this woman had managed to change that. That didn't mean Chakotay had to enjoy learning more about races and warp technology theories he hadn't heard of.

Susan sighed. " Millions of years ago, and I don't know whether or not its true in this reality, there was a race of beings. They were called the Ancients, mostly because they were the first and oldest race in the cosmos. Call them Lanteans, Alterans, the end result is the same." She looked up at the two on the other side of the forcefield. " They were humans." Susan let the implications settle into their minds. " The race I'm from is the second evolution of humanity in my reality, but Ancients found themselves forced to leave their home galaxy because of another race called the Wraith. Some settled on two planets in Earth's solar system. Earth, and its twin world."

" That's impossible. Earth doesn't have a twin world."

Susan almost sneered. " How do you know?"

With a jolt both Chakotay and Seven realised she was right. Unless someone time travelled back, how would they know? The possibility Earth may have had a twin world had never occurred to them, or even their astronomers.

Susan carried on with her story. " When they landed on Earth, the Ancients had hoped to rebuild their civilisation." Her eyes became haunted. " The Wraith were powerful, dangerous. They sucked the life out of humans, feeding on their lifeforce just to survive, and their technology was equal and opposite to the Ancients in many ways, although the Ancients possessed superior technology. Within centuries, the Ancients dwindled, and the Wraith took over. Forced from their galaxy, some settled on Earth, but they found the planet's humans primitive and hostile, but some still stayed. Some even settled on the other planet. The others went away."

" The twin planet was named Mondas, and for a long time, life was rebuilt. Then there was a stellar disaster, and Mondas was blasted into space. The Ancients were trapped, unable to escape. They'd lost their intergalactic ships, and the resources of Mondas were virtually destroyed like the rest of the planet. The Ancients were forced underground." Susan shook her head in sadness. " Imagine trying to rebuild your world, your civilisation, only to lose it again, and then having to make do underground?"

" Because the planet had been blasted into space, the Ancients had problems with time dilation, for them a few generations passed, but to the outside universe centuries had passed, even aeons. But that was the least of the Ancients problems."

Chakotay cocked his head. " In what way?" He was intrigued by this story, and he was fascinated by where it was going.

Susan heaved in a ragged sigh. " For many centuries, the Ancients had been looking for ways of immortality. They'd denounced cloning, because if you make copies of copies of copies, then there is the danger of cellular degradation, so the Ancients decided to simply let the new generations live and learn. I said the others went away," she added pointedly. " I meant to say they'd simply ascended onto a higher level of consciousness alone, free of their bodies, and gathering tremendous knowledge at the same time."

" The people on Mondas had no time to think of ascension. Not when they were getting weak."

" Weak?" Seven asked curiously. " How?"

Susan shrugged. " Their lifespans were getting shorter. Their bodies were wasting away, so their scientists and doctors started looking for a solution. Eventually they discovered it. During their war with the Wraith, the Ancients had decided to use nanotechnology to form a new race of warriors. The nanites evolved, and eventually they became shaped like humans. The Asurans had a vicious streak even the Wraith found hard to match, and the Ancients decided to destroy them with the thought if they destroyed the Wraith, who else would suffer? Although they were destroyed, the Asurans still survived, though they were practically dormant."

" The Ancients on Mondas eventually devised a means of injecting nanites into the body, where they started a conversion process. Bones and muscles would be partially converted to metal and plastic, with electric motors, with organic tissue left alone to allow the body to control the new limbs. The limbs in question would take on the appearance of plastic and metal, and be far stronger and efficient than they had been previously. Generations later, Mondasians with cybernetic limbs were considered normal. They continued their experiments, moving onto the organs, and converting them into devices with important functions. The lungs and heart was replaced with a sophisticated life support mechanism. Eventually the Mondasians found themselves obsessed with the idea of perfection rather than survival."

Seven felt rather than saw Chakotay lean closer to her. " Sounds familiar." He whispered.

Susan and Seven ignored him, the former carrying on with the story of the Cybermen. " Eventually their brains were adjusted, with computers replacing some parts of the brain, though the whole of it was generally organic. Half of a Cyberman's body is organic, with nerves and synapses still relaying processes to the rest of the body. But the heart and lungs are now motors and life support mechanisms. The brains also had the ability to connect with every other brain, linked to a collective mind, but certain weaknesses, as they call them were removed."

" What weaknesses?" Chakotay felt a chill go down his spine. These Cybermen were beginning to sound like the Borg, but they also sounded incredibly different.

" Their emotions were removed, cut out efficiently like a surgical procedure." Susan replied simply, grimly looking at her shocked audience. Even Seven was surprised. The Borg's history was practically non existent, mostly because no former drone knew it, so she couldn't compare it. It was like the Queen herself had declared it irrelevant, but what if the Borg had started that way before they'd moved into the galaxy enmasse?

" Why would they do that?" Chakotay whispered, wondering if the decision had been taken lightly.

Susan sighed. " My grandfather and I travelled to Mondas as the Cybermen started to appear. We could hear the screams as the Mondasians became converted, and we realised why. We'd been fighting the Cybermen for a long time, and their rationality for discarding emotion so cavalierly has always surprised us. Our trip to Mondas was more of a fact finding visit, and we learnt enough to make the theory that they Mondasians had to. They still had human brains." She pinned Seven and Chakotay with a stare. " Imagine you had a nightmare, your entire body was organic one minute, and you were going out with friends before everything changed. Becoming cold, and you saw yourself doing terrible things. Imagine waking up. Only you discover it wasn't a dream, but reality. What would you do?" Susan didn't bother letting them reply because she was far from finished. " You'd wake up screaming. They had to cut out emotions."

Chakotay decided to change the subject. " You mentioned your grandfather. Can we assume he's a time traveller too?"

" Was," Susan corrected sadly. " He died a few years ago."

Susan's sadness was so profound Chakotay instantly felt sorry for her. " I am sorry."

Susan nodded her thanks, but she answered the commander's original question on the subject. " Yes. He was a time and space traveller." She looked away. " My grandfather and I are descended from the Ancients, the ones who'd settled on Earth, and they'd passed on some of their genetics allowing for higher intelligence. We used that intelligence differently, my grandfather used his for science, more specifically subspace in the 1960s, which was far from difficult if you have the kind of genes we do. Me, I'm more of an analytical mathematician, though I am a scientist. My grandfather discovered subspace, and experimented with it. I won't bore you with the details, I'll just summarise. He discovered a way to travel in time and space, create a pocket universe and fitted it inside the most convenient shell he could, in this case a police box because his idea to use nanotechnology to generate a strong shell was too far even for 1960s technology, so we had to make do. Our time machine was far from perfect until grandfather found a way to link our ship with a black hole."

Silence ensured as Seven and Chakotay assimilated this. Naturally it took them a while, the scale described was unbelievable. Then again, Zefram Cochrane had needed to work under conditions most today would find primitive and too difficult to handle, even in the 24th century.

" A black hole?" Chakotay had trouble even saying the astronomical term. " You had a grandfather, who managed to build a time and space machine," Susan held back a smile. At last they saw the difference between time travel and time and space travel. " And he linked it to a black hole?"

Susan nodded, a smile of pride on her face. Despite the many things and hellish conditions they'd found themselves in, she could not help but love her grandfather, and everything they'd accomplished together. She didn't tell them it had been her idea to use mathematics to expand TARDIS's pocket universe to make the time and space machine larger than the single room they'd used when they'd travelled to Skaro.

" Hard to believe, isn't it?" Susan said, " But believe me when I tell you, the task was challenging, but not totally impossible. Like my grandfather says, anyone can understand science if they put their minds to it. He was right."

" After linking the black hole," Susan continued with her story. " We had a viable time and space capsule, capable of travelling to any point in time and space. We called it TARDIS. It stands for Time And Relative Dimension In Space."

Seven was bemused anyone could go that far. " What was it all for?"

Susan shrugged. She understood the question. It was the most logical one to ask, just like it was logical to ask why build a plane to fly. " Knowledge. After he'd discovered subspace, partially by chance and design, grandfather was intrigued enough to continue experiments. Those same experiments showed the existence of quantum foam, mini wormholes in the fabric of time and space. Grandfather was a rich man, he'd made his fortune working as a scientist, though our family has always been wealthy, and we spared no expense on developing our technology to study the foam in detail. Wormholes were still on the theory papers of our time, but the potential possibilities were there. Unfortunately, even the Ancient genes we had wasn't enough to prop one open, so we had to improvise, and this is where warp theory comes in."

Seven made an educated deduction. " You couldn't pass through the wormholes present in quantum foam, because you lacked the technology to make them larger for your timeship to traverse through the wormholes, so you discovered a method of teleportation, most likely you folded the layers of subspace together."

Chakotay looked at her even as Susan smiled. " You're right. We did, it was the only way. Warp theory doesn't just allow you to surf on space, you have so many potential possibilities to work with. You can use a warp field to fold subspace layers together, and you can transport yourselves anywhere almost instantaneously. That's what we did, and it's worked so far."

Susan fixed them both with a dark look. " Listen, I want to get out of here, so I'm prepared to make you a deal. You want to leave this part of the galaxy, and I have the means and the ability to do it. I can help you, but I want to speak to your captain so I can be released."

**Next chapter - Captain Janeway, I presume?**


	3. Chapter 3 Captain Janeway, I presume?

**The Other Universe. **

**" Captain Janeway, I presume?" **

* * *

Janeway looked at the assembled senior staff. All except the Doctor, who was busy in sickbay tending to a patient that was taking all his time, were here in the room. Thery were waiting for the woman called Susan Who to be brought to them. Tuvok and Chakotay had reassured everyone the woman was no threat. But Janeway was concerned about the implications behind the woman's visit. The revelation that in her universe the human race had existed for many thousands of years longer than what was widely accepted brought a question, was that true in their own universe?

Granted, many things in this Susan's universe was different than it was here. In Susan's reality, there should be round portals she called Stargates scattered around, planted on worlds like seeds from a flower. The mode of travel fascinated Janeway, the only stable wormhole known to Starfleet was the Bajoran Wormhole, and it had been considered one of the greatest discoveries of the 24th century. That was until the Dominion war escalated, and Janeway had learnt from communiques there was a massive number of Federation citizens who said the cost was to high a price for exploration when members of their families, innocents were being slaughtered like animals by the Jem'Hadar and their Cardassian allies. In this reality there was no record of the Stargates created by these superhumans, never mind an actual one that opened a stable artificial wormhole with another gate.

The story of these Cybermen filled Janeway with concern, mostly because the story reminded her of the Borg, though the remarkable story about these Ancients, these people who humanity was descended from...

Janeway recalled how Jean Luc Picard had, following Professor Galen's death, discovered an ancient race of beings who'd seeded certain worlds with genetic material to create humanoid life, but somehow these Ancients sounded different.

Janeway decided to begin the meeting, starting with the analysis of the machine called TARDIS.

" B'elanna, Harry," she began, looking both of them in the eye, " before our guest arrives, what can you tell us about her ship?"

B'elanna sighed, her mind racing to try and figure out the best way to describe the ship. Finally she began, " Aside from its interior dimension being larger on the inside, I would say its the most remarkable ship I've ever seen. We haven't done an exact check on it yet, but there seem to be dozens of rooms."

" There's a wardrobe, some kind of astrometric lab," Kim added.

" We scanned the ship's computer," Torres said, " Captain, it was a living brain."

" You mean to say these two people, both scientists, stole a human brain?" Janeway asked in horror, suddenly she was having misgivings.

B'elanna realised at once she'd said the wrong thing in describing the computer, " No, Captain, I don't think they did." Torres stood up, she always thought best when she was speaking. " We already use bioneural circuitry, and we have met other races who use biochemical technology for their computer systems. Don't forget Species 8472, they based their technology on organics. The brain computer in TARDIS seems to be an artificially created lump of organic matter. The perfect brain."

" How does it travel?"

Torres sighed, leaving it up to Kim to explain it as best he could.

" To be honest, we have no idea," seeing Janeways face, Harry did his best to explain. " We've taken enough scans to know its not a simple transporter propelled starship, it doesn't use warp technology, or if it does then it uses a different principle to our own engines."

" It doesn't depend exclusively on antimatter, either," Torres added, " though there were antimatter particles inside it. There was some sort of, I dunno," she shrugged as she tried to describe it, " power source. It contained a massive amount of graviton energy, the sort you'd find in a black hole. Chroniton particles, and subspace energy. There were traces of dark matter particles and antimatter."

The doors swished open and Tuvok entered, Susan was right behind him.

Brown eyes locked onto Janeway.

" Captain Janeway, I presume?" Susan asked.

Janeway stood up. " I am. Please take a seat."

SIlently Susan sat down though Janeway didn't retake her seat.

" First, why did you come to this reality?" Janeway asked.

Susan chuckled. " I could say I was exploring, but for an honest answer I would say I was trying to rediscover myself. Since my grandfather died I've been toying with the idea of just chucking in the idea of travelling through time and space. I remembered we'd collected a piece of Ancient technology that allows travel to different realities. The Ancients used a technology called Quantum mirrors. They work by creating a wormhole to different realities, homing in on the different quantum phase frequency of that reality."

" You used this mirror?" Tuvok asked.

Susan shook his head. " No, grandfather and I often made contact with the Ancients, sometimes in their rise, sometimes in their later years. We first became aware of the Ancients when we discovered a Stargate on another world. It was in the Milky way. Soon we discovered more of them, and it didn't take a genius to realise what they were. The Stargates work by dialling addresses, there's a ring on the stargates that show different sections of a constellation. You dial up where you want to go, and the wormhole takes you there.

" Incredible." Janeway breathed.

Susan quirked a brow. " In my reality," she carried on, " that sort of technology's commonplace. There's nothing unique about finding Stargates in a galaxy. The Ancients merely constructed them to avoid a long tiring space journey. Besides gate travel also develops underdeveloped species into travelling the galaxy, creating new cultures. Many races in my reality have benefited and suffered for it."

As Susan had expected the word suffered brought them all up. " What do you mean, suffered?" A young Asian officer asked.

" In my reality, Earth travelled through the gate, and they quickly found an enemy in the form of the Goa'uld, a race of parasites inhabiting human bodies. They called themselves ' Gods,'" Susan sneered. " They enslaved all life in the Milky way, and they'd shaped many cultures on Earth. Humans born on Earth were taken as slaves, and soon foot soldiers for the Goa'uld. On their first mission, the blundering idiots from Earth came face to face with Ra, the supreme System Lord of the Goa'uld empire." Susan ignored the looks exchanged at the name of the System lord, but she decided to comment about it. " That's right, the Goa'uld shaped religions, including the Egyptian, Greek, Aztec, and many others. The names of the Goa'uld filtered through Earth mythology.

" Ra was killed in a nuclear blast, but that was far from the end. If the US air force, who had control of the Stargate, had bothered to gather more intelligence on the Goa'uld, they would've realised locking the gate down was not going to help. A year later, another Goa'uld system lord came to Earth and kidnapped a human woman was a prospective host."

Susan gave a quick and rushed summary of the Human-Goa'uld war, culminating in the attack on Earth that would see the deaths of millions of people worldwide.

" Why didn't you try and stop this?" The asian officer asked disbelievingly.

" What would be the point?" Susan asked. " The human race in my reality were still locked in pointless debates, fighting amongst themselves. Besides that the US government had taken it on themselves to venture into the galaxy and drew the attention of Earth to enemies like the Goa'uld. The attack changed all that, there was all kinds of anger towards America for years to come but out of all that came benefits. Knowledge of aliens, other worlds, new sciences and technologies...they didn't completely outweigh the damage, but it helped nonetheless. Every cloud has a silver lining, surely you know the saying?"

Judging from the expressions of the idiots round the table Susan could see they were already making assumptions about her, so she decided to nip it in a bud.

" Look it at this way," Susan said, " suppose me and my grandfather, either of us, have interfered with the attack. What would be the aftermath? The US government would sweep the whole thing under the rug, as usual. They would also have tried to capture us and our time and space machine. That's not why we built TARDIS. TARDIS was designed to explore, to learn. The teams sent through the gate would cause more harm than good. Besides years later, Earth was still being rebuilt, and yet an expedition ventured into the Pegasus galaxy to the lost city of the Ancients, and found themselves face to face with an enemy that made the Goa'uld look like toy soldiers. Supposing I interfered, then the expedition would've been so secret no one besides the president of the US would've been aware of it. Don't you dare judge me."

Seeing they were getting off track, Janeway decided to begin a different track.

" My first officer has said you made a comment on our warp engines," Janeway paused, dangling that sentence in front of Susan. She was hoping the mysterious traveller would carry on with her explanation from there, but Susan refused to take the bait.

" That's right."

Curbing her irritation, Janeway carried on, " Can you explain it for us?"

" In my reality, it's not unusual for races just beginning to explore space and see the stars find the distances too great," Susan began. " I imagine you're aware space is curved, and it can be warped. Therefore it's logical for a species to take advantage of that property. Its a basic form of faster than light technology, but its practical until you find another more powerful drive to take its place. Races in my reality that uses it are the Daleks, the Ancients before they developed hyperdrive, and the Asgard to name a few.

" But those races drives are different from yours. You ride on a warped space bubble, the more layers to this bubble the fast you ride, like a surfboard. The races in my universe simply warp space, and simply fold it so light years can be crossed in seconds, minutes." Susan clicked her fingers.

" Can you use that to get us home?" The officer with the facial ridges asked, and many of the senior staff were looking at her expectantly.

Susan had gathered enough from this ship's crew they'd been lost in this part of the galaxy for years already, though she'd gathered enough to know they'd encountered means of cutting their journey short with new technologies and sometimes subspace corridors. Getting home was a dream for this crew, and it was the one thing that kept them going.

" I see no reason why not," Susan began, but she had to restore order by adding. " I might be able to adjust your engines depending on what configuration you've got already, but I see no problem."

The red alert alarms went off. Susan frowned. " What the hell-?" She whispered.

Janeway's combadge chirped. " Captain to the bridge!"

Jsneway and the others were getting up anyway at the sound of the alarms. " We're on our way."

* * *

Susan had to admit the Starfleet crew were highly efficient in the face of an emergency.

" It dropped out of nowhere, ma'am," the duty officer in command informed Janeway. " Then it started scanning us and raised its weapons 30 seconds before I called you."

Janeway nodded. " You did the right thing. Put it up on the screen."

The sight on the screen filled Susan with horror. " Daleks?" She whispered in horror.

Chakotay had heard her. " Daleks?" He said. " You said they existed in your reality, that they possessed powerful warp engines. What are they?"

The question managed to shake Susan out of her horror. Just.

" If I were you Captain, I'd blast that ship out of existence."

* * *

The Dalek ship was a fighter. It was a small tactical vessel, designed purely for stealth missions and attack runs. It was smaller than a battleship, but that made it faster and more manoeverable despite the fact the Daleks designed their ships with multiple gravity engines for extra bursts of speed and impulse engines with boosters.

Though smaller than Voyager, the ship was in many ways superior to its Starfleet contemporary. Its power source was greater than the Starfleet vessels because of its matter/antimatter fusion core, and its weapons were brutal.

The Daleks used this kind of ship for long range tactical missions, and since it was equipped with a spatial warp drive and a low level hyperdrive engine, the ship's range was quite large. Inside the ship were four Daleks - a commander and strategist, a tactical drone, a medical and science officer, and an engineer.

" Confirmation on alien ship," the scientist grated, " it is the Starship Voyager. Records of various races in this section of the galaxy indicate it is travelling to the other side."

The commander knew this already, but didn't comment. " Relay findings to Supreme Dalek."

" I obey." The scientist connected to the ships communications system, and within moments had transmitted findings.

* * *

If Susan had been aware of the Dalek presence in the Milky way, she would've likened it to the tactics of the Daleks in her own reality. Indeed there were many similarities but differences between the two Dalek races.

One of them was the hierarchy of the Daleks.

It was identical. The Daleks had a colour coded society, and each caste worked in tandem with the others to preserve the Dalek species and to advance the species further to its goal of total supremacy as dictated by Davros's genetic tampering.

At the top and in total command of the Daleks was the Dalek emperor. Coloured White, and plugged into the Daleks, controlling their actions via the pathweb and the Dalek Computer Network which, in the days before their discovery of subspace, had been radio based, the Emperor saw everything going on in his empire. The Emperor was a cross between all the castes of the Dalek race; he had the scientific apitude of the science caste, the strategic ability of the strategists, and the command ability of the Supreme Daleks.

Beneath the Emperor were proxies, second in commands. The Dalek Prime Minister and the Dalek Prime, and the Gold Dalek. The Prime Minister was in command of the Dalek parliament, the government that streaked across all the castes. The Dalek Prime controlled matters of state, and the Gold Dalek was nothing more than a chancellor in command of the Supreme Council, the commanders of the Dalek fleets.

The Supreme Daleks were commanders. Coloured black with gold and silver sensor plating, the supremes were the elite that controlled the battle and exploration strategies of the Daleks. The supremes were aided by the red Daleks, who took the role of assistants or low levels of military, similar to captains or majors in some races hierarchies.

The Strategist Daleks, coloured blue, were an elite to themselves. Genetically programmed to think seven steps ahead of the other castes for the greater good, the strategists were assigned as mission commanders and force leaders. Put a Dalek Strategist in a chess game, and the Dalek would think ten moves ahead of the opponent before the game even started. All Daleks had this logical ability, as part of their genetic manipulation, but the strategists were more powerful.

The Science caste was where you started to see Dalek technical and scientific ability. Standing out in orange casings, the scientists were similar to the strategists, though their minds were geared more to sciences; physics, biology, genetics. Expeditions of scientists would be sent throughout the explored sectors to study the sciences of the various races to add to the Dalek memory records. It was the scientists who were responsible for the study and development of biogenic weaponry, but also the study of technologies that could augment the Daleks themselves.

Of all the castes, there was nothing more important than the Eternal Daleks when it came to preserving Dalek purity, the one thing the Daleks held most dear. Coloured yellow, the Eternals were a law unto themselves. They existed above and beyond the Emperor and the councils of the Daleks. The Eternals were responsible for genetically monitoring the manufacture of new Dalek embryos, aided by the green Geneticist Daleks.

Beneath them were the Drones. The army of the Daleks stood out in their dark grey casings. The Daleks selected the right kind of embryo and bred the right numbers up, and understandably the Drones outnumbered all the others because they were the most expendible. In terms of intelligence, compared a human, all forms of Dalek were more intelligent, but the Drones were not as intelligent as the Daleks above them.

* * *

The Dalek presence in the Milky way was, technically, a scientific expedition organised by the Dalek Emperor and the Scientist and Strategist castes. Designed to simply travel to another galaxy, and send back profiles on the various races and their strengths, but also in the terms of the technologies. The Daleks had been in the Milky way for years, gathering and learning more things about the Milky way. For instance they'd come across a Borg cube hanging limp in space. The Daleks had boarded the ship, and managed to disconnect the cube from the rest of the collective. The Scientists were still examining it, but the knowledge in the database made it worthwhile, and many aspects of the cube were similar to the designs in Dalek ships. Borg nanotechnology designs had already found uses in the Dalek empire, repairing their ships and their casings where in the past a damaged ship would spend weeks in a dock facility and undergo lengthy repairs there depending on the damage, and a casing damaged would require the use of a new one. Nanoprobes became nanogenes, and they would convert slaves into Dalek puppets, which replaced the need for robomen conversion.

Another discovery was the Phage inflicted on the Vidiians. The idea of a genetic disease designed to destroy genetic codes fascinated the Daleks.

The encounter with the Vaadwaur race brought the Daleks knowledge of the Underspace, natural subspace corridors weaving through space. After ripping the knowledge from the Vaadwaur, the Daleks had started exploring the Underspace, wiping out the Turei who now owned it, and started cleaning the mess up after years of neglect.

The discovery of the Underspace had caused a stir in the Empire. With the knowledge of Underspace, the spread of the Daleks would be much more rapid and they wouldn't need to worry about hyperspace engines anymore.

The Expedition commander was a Dalek supreme.

* * *

The Dalek supreme was mounted on a platform, connected into the Dalek computer network via cables. In effect, the creature could see everything happening in the Milky way through the eyestalks of the Daleks under its command.

It received the message from the ship pursuing Voyager. It sent one message. " Capture the ship. Exterminate the crew."

* * *

Susan was trying to explain the Daleks to the Starfleet officers. It was hard because none of them could believe it.

" The Daleks are a mutated species, created after decades of war on the planet Skaro. They exist inside protective casings that're a cross between a life support system, a spacesuit, and battle armour. The creature's a nightmare. The Dalek race is genetically engineered, every emotion removed except hate for those not Dalek."

Janeway found all this hard to believe. " How do we reason with them? Let them know we're no harm."

Susan snorted in disbelief. " The last time I saw someone try that was on Skaro. He was a Thal, one of the Daleks hereditory enemies and the Thal race were starving outside their city. All he wanted was to become friendly with the Daleks and put aside their differences. He was killed in cold blood."

" Despite the ship's weapons being readied, these Daleks do not seem prepared to attack us, Captain." Tuvok reported from his tactical console.

Susan shook her head. " Its a Dalek protocol. That is a scout fighter. It's not meant for long range attacks. Knowing the Daleks, they've already sent a message to their superiors in the Andromeda galaxy."

The moment the last two words were out of her mouth Susan regretted them at once, especially when she remembered how much the Voyager crew wanted to return to Earth.

" The Andromeda galaxy?" Kim repeated. " These Daleks might get us home!"

" Strange, I seem to remember promising you I'd look into improving your warp engines, or don't you remember?" Susan glared at them. " The Daleks won't help you."

" How can you be sure? Like you said, this isn't your reality."

Susan sneered at Janeway, not even bothering with hiding her growing contempt. " Contact them, tell them your plight if you want to give out crucial information." Susan folded her arms and stood aside.

Tuvok immediately prevented a tactical nightmare. " Captain, I must remind you, Starfleet regulations prevent us from informing potentially hostile aliens about our current status."

" What's the matter Tuvok, don't you wanna return home?" Kim asked.

" It doesn't matter to the Daleks if you want to return to Earth. They won't help you." Susan said.

Janeway made her decision. " Objections noted, Mr Tuvok. Open a channel," she ordered. " Dalek vessel," Janeway began, " this is Captain Kathryn Janeway of the Federation Starship Voyager. We have been stranded in the Delta quadrant, but we have someone on our ship who claims to know of your race. Please help us."

Susan was furious. She stormed over. " You stupid, arrogant, pompous bitch. You shouldn't have mentioned me. Now when they attack, they'll do a good job of interrogating everyone onboard."

Before Janeway could say there was no way of telling if the Daleks would attack, they went and proved her wrong. A sudden alarm from the tactical station made Tuvok shout, " Shields are up, Dalek vessel is launching missiles. Unknown design."

Susan ran to the tactical station. " Their distronic missiles," she said. " They're like neutron missiles, only they involve greater neutron breakdown. Do you mind if I adjust your shields?"

Normally Tuvok would mind, but in this case he had no option. Logically this woman knew more about the Daleks than they did, and if she could help him that was his decison. He moved out of the way. Susan frowned at the controls, then she started making the relevant adjustments.

" It's a rushed job," Susan was saying. " But I'm programming the shields to reflect the worst of the explosion and impact away when the missiles impact."

She glanced at the screen, the sight of the two distronic missiles bearing down on the Voyager. She closed her eyes and prayed this would work.

When the impact finally arrived, Voyager rocked in the bright bliding light of the explosions. Susan blinked at the light, but it faded quickly. She had to move fast. The Daleks were not likely to let them get away with that, though for the time being they should be stunned.

Distronic weapons were more powerful than antimatter, hell they used it anyway, but the effects were augmented by nuclear fission and fusion. No matter, the Daleks had plenty of weapons in their arsenal.

" I saw from your ship you ride on space, do you have a deflector to prevent hull breaches from particles of dust?" Susan asked.

" Yes," Janeway replied, wondering how this was relevant.

" I've got an idea that can deal with the Daleks, but I need the deflector."

Tuvok led her over to deflector control. " You can access it from here."

" Thank you."

* * *

The scout ship commander was astonished by the destruction of the distronic missiles. The Daleks had studied this galaxy long enough to know the knowledge of such weapons and how to defend against them was unknown to the races here, and yet this ship had managed to deflect them. Had it always had this capacity, or was it what the captain of the primitive vessel had said, there was someone on the ship with knowledge of their technology?

The commander sent a report to the Galaxy Supreme, and awaited orders.

* * *

The deflector control station was a mish mash of opticable and isolinear chips. Janeway, Chakotay and Seven were watching Susan worriedly as she used a tool called a sonic screwdriver to modify the chips to accept her commands.

" I presume you know what you're doing?" Janeway asked quietly.

Susan didn't turn round, her ancient descended mind working on the problem, but she answered. " Yes, I do."

" What are you doing?"

" Working." Susan replied shortly.

Janeway bristled, but Chakotay, seeing the captain and the traveller were not going to become friends anytime soon, asked quietly. " What are you trying to do, Susan?"

Susan sighed. " I'm modifying your deflector dish to attack the Dalek power grid. The Dalek casings are powered in three ways, through psychokinetic power, the power of the mind itself, cosmic energy, and finally static electricity through power feeds in the floors alone. The Daleks on that ship are using static, mostly because it saves the Daleks the resources to play with mind and cosmic power." Susan buzzed her screwdriver at a new connection. " I'm trying to make the dish as stealthy as possible, and I wouldn't try calling the Daleks again. They just won't listen."

Janeway had to concede Susan had a point.

" What do you suggest we do?" She asked. Her attention may have been focused on Susan's back as she worked, but her words were directed to her officers.

" The Dalek ship has backed off," Kim reported from his station.

" But they're not going to surrender," Susan pointed out, poking her head back out to gaze solemnly at the crew. " My little trick surprised them. Now, I imagine the commander on that ship is awaiting orders from the Dalek supreme."

" Dalek supreme?" Seven asked.

Susan gave them a brief accounting of the Dalek hierarchy. " It comes with being grown in vats," she told them darkly. " The Daleks select the embryos they need most of all, then breed the right numbers up. The soldiers outnumber everyone because they're the most expendable."

" What do you think is commanding that ship?"

" Probably a red Dalek," Susan shrugged. " With a strategist gene graft to make it more intelligent, though it can't make the big decisions on its own like a proper Strategist or a more intelligent Dalek. There are only four Daleks on that ship."

" Are you sure they won't talk?" Janeway was hoping the answer was no, but Susan shook her head. " Trust me Captain, many races have fallen because of their inability to fight, and not just because the Daleks will not listen, but because they couldn't see themselves fighting a vastly more powerful foe."

" How long do you think they've been here, in our galaxy?" Paris asked.

Susan shook her head in thought. " Decades, possibly. The Daleks like being a few steps ahead of their enemy, that's why they created the Strategists. No, the Emperor and the councils decided the study of the nearest galaxy was the surest way to gather decent intelligence and technologies. It's an old tactic of the Daleks. Besides if anything happens to the Emperor or the empire, this lot can take control easily."

" Very neat," Paris commented, impressed.

" Yep," Susan agreed, still working.

" Will the Daleks attack again?"

Susan laughed. " Of course they will. The Daleks are perhaps the most advanced warrior race you'll ever meet."

" I don't know about that," Chakotay straightened. " Our part of the galaxy is fighting a war with an empire called the Dominion."

" How powerful are they?" Susan asked, her attention fixed on a chip infront of her.

" Very. They destroy entire fleets, they're able to replenish their ship numbers and their genetically armed soldiers at phenomenal rates." Chakotay replied stiffly with a hint of buried but burning rage. He's lost someone, Susan thought.

" The Daleks can rebuilt ships and replace their lost soldiers as well. They can convert the mineral wealth of any world, rock, moon, or asteroid into anything they want. They've even been known to transmute the cores of suns into iron, making the star go nova. Can this Dominion do that?"

The senior staff looked shaken, and Chakotay finally shook his head. " No."

" Then your Dominion will be exterminated, en masse." Susan said, getting back to work.

Grimly the senior staff and most of the bridge crew glanced at one another. This was worse than they'd thought.


	4. Chapter 4 Dalek

**The Other universe. **

**Dalek. **

* * *

Susan frowned as she worked on the tactical systems with her sonic screwdriver after modifying the deflector, adjusting power systems to shields and weapons. She'd already worked on the shields to adjust to the impacts of Dalek firepower, not a difficult task in itself, but unfortunately the weapons were not as powerful as she'd hoped. Still that didn't mean they were not completely hopeless. Susan hoped she could do something with the technology, she just hoped she had time.

Finally she stood up from her work, and nodded at Tuvok. " I've done what I can." She said shortly.

The Vulcan nodded, examining the controls. " Upgrades have been made, Captain."

Janeway came over. " Susan," she addressed the time traveller. " Can these weapon adjustments help us capture the Dalek ship?"

" What for?" Susan asked, wondering what this fool was talking about now.

" We need to examine their propulsion system. It might help us get home."

Susan sighed. " Captain, I have already promised you I would get you home. Besides we can't capture the Dalek ship, not that it won't mean anything."

" Why do you say that?" Chakotay asked.

Susan closed her eyes, and tried to get some of her sanity back. Before she could hurl some verbal abuse at these fools, the Dalek ship launched bursts of light at Voyager. The bombardment didn't rock the ship, but there was worse to come. " Captain, our shields are almost gone." Tuvok announced.

Susan sighed, then she pushed the Vulcan out of the way, and started working on the console. " You are firing a photon torpedo," Tuvok grabbed her, making Susan cry out, but she was able to tap a control. There was a surge of power that went through the artificial gravity plating, and it shot out towards the Dalek ship, and it exploded.

Janeway swung round, glaring at Susan with rage. " Was that really necessary?"

Susan didn't have time to reply; there was another flash of light on the bridge. It coalesced into a familiar shape. The Dalek swung its eyestalk back and forth. " Transport complete. EXTERMINATE!" It raised its gunstick and it fired a blast of blue energy at the helm station. Paris barely had enough time to get out of the way before his entire console exploded.

Susan gaped, energy weapons? That was new. The Daleks she'd met in the past had used a kind of plasma gas. There were advantages, one the Daleks could fire burst of gas in an environment where there was a dampening field that stopped energy weapons, but energy weapons had advantages of their own; greater accuracy and power, but they weren't perfect. No weapon was unless it was a wormhole weapon.

The sudden appearance of the Dalek and its attack seemed to convince the crew of the dangers of the Daleks. Whipping out hand phasers, they started fighting back. The beams of gold energy hit the Dalek's forcefield repeatedly. " EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

Susan rubbed her arms from where Tuvok had held her, the Vulcan was now busily fighting the Dalek alongside the other Voyager crewmembers. Slipping her sonic screwdriver back into her hand, Susan got on her stomach, and started crawling towards the Dalek. Fortunately it was occupied with fighting against the Starfleet crew. Susan made an adjustment to her screwdriver, and then threw herself against the Dalek.

" EMERGENCY, EMERGENCY!" It cried in panic.

" Oh, shut up!" Susan snapped at it with gritted teeth, slapping her screwdriver against the casing. The Dalek screamed in agony as the sonic waves killed it.

Finally the Dalek's limbs and eyestalk drooped. Susan panted.

Paris checked his console, and backed away quickly. It was smoking, the whole thing was burnt out solid. He nodded at Susan. " Thanks," he said in relief the Dalek was dead.

Susan smiled weakly. " Don't thank me just yet. The Daleks are linked to a telepathic web, a path web. It contains everything about them, their history, technology, everything. And it's hackerproof. Believe me, I've tried in the past. Worse, the Daleks will know what we've done." She nodded at the creature she was standing next to. " We've got to get the creature out of it, and we've also got to find out what the Daleks are planning for the Milky way otherwise you won't have a home to go to. I've got to check the personal computer inside, it won't be as well linked to the path web, and it should contain a great deal of the Dalek battleplans."

Harry Kim came over, a tricorder in his hand, and he was just flipping it open before Susan stopped him. " Hey, stop! What're you doing?"

" I'm going to scan it."

Susan scoffed. " You people really like thinking up stupid plans, don't you? Is that hand scanner linked to the computers on your ship?"

Kim was a little bit offended in the attack on his intelligence, but he was bemused by Susan's second question. " Yes, of course it is. It's how we study things close up."

Susan smiled sweetly. " Dalek casings keep functioning even with the mutant inside dead. It's weapons don't just include a blaster, it also includes more subtle weapons. There are possibly viral transmitters in and out of this casing, and if one of them interacts with this ships systems then it will kill you. I once boarded a spaceship in my reality who were killed because they foolishly scanned a Dalek, and it transmitted a virus. Do you want to know what it did then? The ship's computers were reprogrammed, and it opened airlocks to the inside of the ship, and also shut down the life support. Do you want to go the same way?"

None of the crew did.

" Where can you examine it without it interfacing with our ship's systems?" Chakotay asked.

Susan considered. " Outside with me wearing a space suit."

* * *

Finding a place on the hull flat enough to examine the Dalek was relatively straight forward, and it helped put Susan's mind at ease. Using a spacesuit was easy, you just had to make sure the damn thing didn't leak air. Janeway had wanted her to study the Dalek in the lab, but Susan had argued with her by saying the Dalek's technology was limited, and she sweetened the deal by saying she would dump a load of uncontaminated-by-nasty-viruses database into Voyager's Starfleet database.

Susan had brought out a laptop from TARDIS, a laptop that contained nothing on it, and a disc that she used to interact with Dalek computers. If there was one thing the Daleks were good at doing, it was layering their computers with viruses. But Susan had a secret weapon. She'd once connected her mind with a Dalek computer linked to the mind of mutant, and it almost drove her to kill her loved ones. The memory made Susan pause, it always hurt her when she remembered her grandfather and Louise walking on ice around her for a long time after. The hatred of the Dalek had pushed into her mind had almost driven her to almost kill not just the people she loved, but also murder 3 whole races.

Her grandfather had once more stumbled across a planet on the verge of being conquered by the Daleks, and they managed to avert the whole thing but not before Susan had been kidnapped, and her mind had been interfaced with that of a Daleks' so the Daleks would learn about time travel technology, and the weaknesses of other species, and her mind had been exposed to the knowledge of a Dalek, similar to the repositories of knowledge the Ancients had littered her home universe with during their heyday. But there was a side effect; the Dalek had infected her with the overwhelming hatred of the Dalek race, a hatred for everything different.

She'd injured her grandfather and cousin, took control of TARDIS, and went on a rampage through two galaxies before she was stopped. But the damage had been enormous. Her ancient and Asgard knowledge, coupled with what she'd gleaned on her travels had made her a terrifying weapon, and she almost destroyed said three races before she was stopped. The memory still haunted her, and her grandfather had left her at home for a long time, but something good had come out of it. The Dalek had transferred knowledge to her mind, and soon she was able to construct a computer program that was based on Dalek computer logic. She was using that now to interface with the Dalek personal computer, but unfortunately it wasn't enough to allow access to the pathweb. No. Only Dalek DNA held the answer to that, and it was a closely guarded secret though it didn't stop Susan and her grandfather to occasionally try to break into it to reprogram the Daleks to exterminate each other.

Now Susan was sitting next to the Dalek as it was standing on a magnetic pad the Voyager crew had kindly provided, and she was interfaced with the Dalek personal computer. If she'd tried this without what she knew about Dalek computers then she would be working on this for years, but fortunately her time with the Asgard and the Ancients had provided her with a great deal of knowledge, knowledge she'd almost used against innocents.

Susan shook off the memory, and got to work. Dalek computers were easy when you had a backdoor to them, and it wasn't long before she'd linked to the Dalek's logs. There was a massive Dalek army in the galaxy, and it was reaching the point where it's numbers were finished. Susan quirked a brow at the amount of time the Daleks had been in the galaxy; 600 years. In that time they'd amassed a vast amount of information about different alien races, documenting the rise of powers like the Borg, the Dominion, the Cardassian, Romulan, and Klingon empires, and the growth of the United Federation of Planets, what races were involved, the technologies that could potentially expand the Dalek's own sphere of influence, and the Daleks had done a great deal of homework on the subjects. They'd routinely captured different starships, ripped the knowledge from the minds of the crews about cultures, technology, and sent the data back to Skaro for analysis.

Susan checked the Dalek computer, and found the Milky way was already successful for collecting and gathering knowledge, and already the army was ready to conquer the galaxy. A means of wiping out the Borg collective had already been discovered and would be deployed soon, but the Daleks already had a small group in the sector of the galaxy the Federation called the Alpha Quadrant...Susan closed her laptop in a rush, and activated the comlink between her suit and the Voyager crew.

" Captain," Susan shouted without preliminaries. " We need to get you back to the Alpha Quadrant. NOW!"

* * *

Janeway and the rest of the command staff were gazing at Susan with horror, even Tuvok though his horror was hidden by his calm.

" Are you sure about this?"

Susan nodded grimly. " You told me there was a war your Federation was fighting, the war against the Dominion. Well, the Daleks have already made their move. They've recently become allies of the Dominion."

" Where are the Daleks anyway?" Kim asked. " Surely if they've allied themselves with the Dominion, they wouldn't reveal themselves."

Susan nodded again. " True. They wouldn't. A small battlefleet, an estimated thousand ships would make short work of anything your Federation or the Dominion could throw back at them. The Daleks have sent a Chief Strategist to supervise the complete extermination of the Founders of the Dominion, and to arrange the restructuring of their foot soldiers."

Torres frowned. " How?"

" According to the intelligence gathered by the Daleks, the Jem'Hadar are genetically enhanced super soldiers, but the Daleks have already worked out how to use that to their advantage. The next breed of Jem'Hadar have been augmented with Dalek technology, and a piece of their brain is to be removed to give the Daleks complete access to their minds. They won't obey their precious founders after that." Susan replied.

The command staff looked at each other. In the time they'd had communications with Starfleet once more, the news of the Dominion war filled them with horror. The Jem'Hadar were more horrifying than the Klingons, or any other warriors Starfleet had encountered. If Susan was right, and they had no reason to suspect she was wrong on this one.

Janeway sighed. " What do you recommend?"

All the senior staff looked at her with the exception of Tuvok. Janeway asked for options, yes, but her specialty lay in following her own decisions, but this was a situation beyond her ability to control. Whereas Susan had more experience with the Daleks, and she knew more about what was at stake.

Susan smiled. " I can modify your ships engines, and you'll be able to move faster than ever before. More importantly, you'll have the Daleks technical database," she held up her laptop, " at hand. Now the Daleks haven't formally allowed any of their ships to be involved in the battles against your starships, so you'll have time to prepare."

Janeway looked at the waiting faces of her staff. " Right," she said sharply. " Mr Tuvok, take the database from Susan and build up a profile on what we can do to counteract the Dalek's firepower."

The Vulcan nodded. " Aye, Captain."

Janeway added. " Seven, Harry, help him. Susan, can you work with B'elanna to improve our warp engines?"

Susan looked over at the half Klingon engineer. " I don't see why not."

* * *

The warp core was beautiful, Susan decided to herself. A column containing matter and antimatter, held in check by magnetic constriction to prevent annihilation. The energy produced inside was enough to warp space, allowing faster than light travel. It was similar to the principles of the Asgard warp technology, but different. The Asgard had used matter/antimatter technology to produce a warp ship, and it had worked. Then they'd discovered how to create neutrino ion generators to grant an increase in energy production before they met the Ancients, who taught them how to enter and exit hyperspace. Susan smiled as she remembered the first contact between the Asgard and the Ancients, who in many ways were alike. The Asgard were explorers, just like the Ancients, and they were a friendly and noble race. The Ancients had gotten on well with the Asgard before they met the Furlings and the Nox, the interactions with those two species slower to cultivate with the Furlings as they were a somewhat brusque race.

Susan shook her head of the memories, reminding herself of how the Asgard were dying. Not on my watch, she thought.

B'elanna Torres studied the time/space traveller with a smile on her lips as Susan looked at the warp core. " Tell me something," she began and waited for Susan to divert her attention away from the warp core and onto her. " What?" Susan asked.

" About the races you know of that use warp technology in your universe?"

Susan smiled. " Well, the Ancients discovered how to warp space, and they perfected it to the point where they lowered the ships inertial mass to allow the ship to move through subpsace and pass through galaxies."

B'elanna gaped. It was possible to lower the mass of a starship, its crew, its equipment, and pass through galaxies if it was pushed through subpsace. Oh boy, she was gonna have so much fun thinking of a way to do that...

She shook herself from her mental melee when she saw Susan had walked away from her and went to a computer console, and was busily working at the controls.

" What're you doing?" B'elanna asked as she watched Susan work.

" What I just told you, about the Ancients," Susan grinned then tapped her head. " Got the formula right in here."

Torres gasped. " Yeah," Susan chuckled at her look.

" How long will it take us to reach home?"

Susan paused at the question, considering. " The Ancients designed this formula because their method of travel wasn't unlike what you're using today. They created it as part of their program to explore subspace, and work on a means of taking advantage of some of its properties. This warp equation," she pointed at the screen, " is their first step."

Torres was puzzled. " First step into what?"

Susan smiled. " Hyperspace. A realm of subspace where the laws of physics have no meaning. The Asgard gave the humans of my reality a proper hyperspace technology, but this should do for now for yours."

" How fast will it go?"

" In my universe, the Ancients sent a ship with a drive formula like this before they actually created their first hyperdrive, and that same ship was lost, but it could cover galaxies in hours. Minutes."

Torres had to look away, but she couldn't as her eyes followed the numbers of the imprinted equation. To think such a simple mathematical formula could open the doors to flight beyond the galaxy, borders of...

* * *

" A warp formula that can give us what transwarp barely could?" Janeway gasped; in truth she was no better than the rest of her bridge crew. A warp formula that could take them...anywhere?

B'elanna's voice came over the comm. system, excited. " From what I can make of it. It's remarkably simple, but I'm guessing that's what these Ancients had wanted in Susan's universe. The formula's also reprogrammed our warp coils, our deflector arrays, our inertial dampeners to compensate for the velocities present."

Janeway closed her eyes. Seven years, for seven years they'd more or less had the answer to return home, and they hadn't realised it.

" When can we go?" She asked, trying and failing to curb her enthusiasm.

Susan's voice filtered through now. " We can go now."

Janeway cut off the link and sat down in her chair. " Mr Paris," she turned her neck painfully towards Harry's station as the helm was still being repaired, " set a course for home."

Paris didn't hide his enthusiasm. " Aye, Captain."

* * *

Voyager shot into warp, though unlike any kind of warp they'd experienced before. Even the advanced quantum slipstream drive, and the Borg transwarp drives of the Borg collective, and the Vaadwaur subspace corridors could not compare to the effect of the enhanced warp drive Susan had programmed into Voyager's computer. As Voyager shot into warp, it was the same effect; the ship's warp engines were stretched like elastic, but as soon as the ship entered warp space, the faster than light effect changed from the usual starscape to an aurora of purple, green, and blue streams of light and energy.

* * *

**Author's note. I'm sorry for the long wait. **


End file.
